Earl of Lindsay: My Lords, I share the concerns about how standards will be maintained when negotiating new trade agreements and therefore, in principle, support what many of the amendments in this group are trying to achieve. In that context, I welcome the establishment by the DIT and Defra of the new Trade and Agriculture Commission. However, at the same time, I strongly support the important point made by my noble friend Lady McIntosh of Pickering and the noble Lords, Lord Curry of Kirkharle, Lord Cameron of Dillington and Lord Krebs, and others. A trade standards commission needs to be more than a temporary body with a six-month lifespan. It should be a permanent body with a continuing and influential role in any and all future trade negotiations, as is the United States International Trade Commission, among other examples.
The UK’s enviable reputation for high standards in food and farming has been achieved through the support of successive Governments for a national framework of standards, conformity assessment and accreditation, collectively referred to as the UK Quality Infrastructure. Here, I declare an interest as the chair of the United Kingdom Accreditation Service, which is the UK’s national accreditation body and a key component of the UKQI. UKAS accreditation is central to ensuring the effectiveness of standards in the UK food and farming industries, through underpinning their  implementation with a robust verification and certification system. As the noble Lord, Lord Curry of Kirkharle, said, verification of compliance with standards in respect of imported products is going to be a huge challenge. I therefore support Amendment 279 in his name, proposing that the remit of the proposed trade, food and farming standards commission include any relevant recommendations on the testing regimes, assurance schemes and certification bodies that might be needed to ensure that imported agri-food products sold in the United Kingdom are produced to appropriately high standards. A standing trade standards commission with this remit would be able to determine how accreditation and linked, neutral cross-border recognition arrangements that underpin standards could be used as a central part of future trade negotiations and agreements.
Before closing, I record my support for Amendment 271, which would require agricultural and food imports to meet domestic standards, and Amendment 273, which would ensure that UK standards on food safety, the environment and animal welfare cannot be undermined by imports produced to lower standards. In doing so, I declare an interest as a vice-president of the Chartered Trading Standards Institute, which also supports these amendments.